The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy announced a new National Microbiome Initiative (NMI) to foster the integrated study of microbiomes across different ecosystems. NMI has three goals:

(1) Supporting interdisciplinary research to answer fundamental questions about microbiomes in diverse ecosystems.

(2) Developing platform technologies that will generate insights and help share knowledge of microbiomes in diverse ecosystems and enhance access to microbiome data.

(3) Expanding the microbiome workforce through citizen science, public engagement, and educational opportunities.

NMI will launch with a combined Federal agency investment of more than $121 million in Fiscal Year (FY) 2016 and 2017 funding for cross-ecosystem microbiome studies. This includes proposed funds: $10M to DOE, $12.5M to NASA, $20M to NIH, $16M to NSF and $15.9M to USDA. A number of universities, foundations and institutes will also fund research on microbiomes. See theWhite House OSTP release for details.